Ears

Female body parts are an infinitely attractive take-off point for what sometimes passes off as feminist discourse. Naomi Wolf demonstrated it emphatically with her vagina, appropriating more mainstream column-inches than all simultaneous efforts to flag such exhausting issues as safe streets, safe work environment, equal wages for women, child care et al. Now, this is not to say that Ms Wolf has no point to make in her latest treatise titled Vagina: a New Biography, not as invasive of our collective mind-space as the highly popular porn version of the good old Mills and Boon called Fifty Shades of Grey. Ms Wolf’s point, as far as I could make out, was that women shamed by their “dirty” vagina are to be liberated, sometimes through oriental mumbo-jumbo about venerating the female sexual organ. But this— if at all I got it right— was after a mind-numbing exploration of tantrik sexual rituals, vulva-shaped pastas et al.

What I am getting at is that the female body is intrinsic to gender discourse, but devoid of politics as it was in Ms Wolf’s latest tome (how I wish she had not scaled down from the high bar she had set with The Beauty Myth). It just gets reduced to the literary version of an item number. Now for me, a hack since the days of my blurry, adolescent confusion about smoking being a statement, to talk of ‘The Ear’ could have been a similarly attractive proposition. God knows, there’s enough anecdotal material for The Ear to equal if not trounce the Vagina’s power to stir things up; figuratively speaking.

“But one could argue that such experiences are not exclusive to the female Ear, although I should add that nuances could be missed by some who may secretly be addressing themselves in third person. The point that I am trying to make is that what we, as female journalists, hear or observe is not usually sensational or sensuous.”

There is the lurid, titillating side to whispers in the corridor of power – Uttar Pradesh cabinet minister Azam Khan’s hushed, yet audible formulation about the “ideal” treatment for the area MP Jaya Prada; the sudden hiss of in-breath that one catches when film star-turned-MP Hema Malini walks into the unshakably composed Arun Jaitley’s room; the sound of collective silence in the House of Elders when the exhaustingly bejewelled and made-up Rekha is sworn in as MP; veteran Jaswant Singh’s whispered insistence to join a human chain to protest against price rise only if he gets to hold hands with two women MPs, and his rendition of Keshav’s dohas in the timeless tradition of poetic romance in the lilting Hindi dialect, to lament the women’s benign regard of his outlandish overtures: “Keshav ke sang as kari, jas arihon na karaye. Chandra badan, mrig lochani baba kahi kahi jaye (Keshav has suffered a fate that he does not wish upon his worst enemies. All the doe-eyed beauties around refer to him as ‘grandfather’.)”

From the sublime heights of Keshav’s poetry to the ridiculous, the political hack’s Ear is trained to catch nuances and intonations that reveal what will never be verbally articulated. A snort, or a chuckle from someone in the ranks denoting contempt for a giant political figure that is not being overtly expressed. The sudden transformation of a lowly MP from the powerful leader’s aide to someone who starts addressing himself in the third person – a practice common among politicians habitual to waving to the balconies, real or imaginary. You can hear it in BJP MP Shahnawaz Hussain’s self-congratulation on being the only Muslim in the BJP who got elected to the House of the People (as opposed to his bête noire, the other token Muslim in the Hindu party, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi who has always been nominated to Parliament as opposed to being elected). “Yeh to Shahnawaz Hussain ka dam hai ki Lok Sabha mein aaye (It is Shahnawaz Hussain’s dynamism that he has got elected to the Lok Sabha),” he says about himself; the Ear detecting a mix of pride (about himself), contempt (for Naqvi) and general sense of having arrived on the political scene after the initial years of tailing Uma Bharati. Or sample the former Bihar legislator Vijay Kumar Shukla aka ‘Munna’ Shukla (currently lodged in Shaheed Khudiram Bose jail in Muzaffarpur on charges of murder) proclaiming that the state of Bihar is ‘synonymous’ with his name: “Sara Bihar Munna-maya ho gaya hai.”

But one could argue that such experiences are not exclusive to the female Ear, although I should add that nuances could be missed by some who may secretly be addressing themselves in third person. The point that I am trying to make is that what we, as female journalists, hear or observe is not usually sensational or sensuous. What is exclusive hearing for the female Ear is the depressingly routine story of undermining professional work, ideas and ideals just because they happen to be generated by a woman. In the mainstream media, you are better off restricting yourself to areas that the current lot of editors feel are ‘natural’ domains for women to think and write about – lifestyle reportage that is mistaken for ‘health coverage’ without touching on the political economy of health, education that focuses less on policy and more on the wonderful private sector that is booming and, of course, cinema and fashion.

It is entirely desirable and understandable that, while covering fashion/lifestyle/cinema, you dress like Bipasha Basu at the ribbon-cutting/launch of the latest Gili diamonds retail outlet. But if you are into covering politics, business, economy, defence or security matters (believe me, there are very few of us out there), rest assured that there is little scope to break the glass ceiling. And, if you do, be prepared to be paid less, be over-worked and branded as so and so’s protégé. There is no subliminal text to this. It is routine, in-your-face and an everyday struggle.

Of course, there are exceptions and instances of manipulation, nepotism and corruption; a certain high-profile anchor breathlessly currying favour with a top corporate fixer, a top politician/bureaucrat/influence peddler pushing his wife/daughter/sister on as prime time anchor, an attractive twenty something twisting her balding, middle-aged boss around her little finger. But then, does it even begin to compare with the hordes of male columnists, big-shot political editors and editors planted at prime places by big corporate bosses and political parties? Or the exclusive back-slapping and camaraderie at the local pub where jobs (the few that are spared by plants of politicians or big business) are fixed?

The long and short of it is that the female Ear, if it happens to be that of a journalist’s, may be trained to catch subtle nuances, intonations and innuendoes that may make a fascinating newspaper copy. But the experiences of the female body and mind in the media, as I suspect is the case in politics, business and all other professions, are similar. Patriarchy and sexism may not be terms as exotic as, say, ‘yoni massage’ but they are what we encounter on a routine basis. In the end, for the Ear or for the Hands, Lips or Feet, for the Woman As A Whole, it is an everyday struggle. We don’t make much of it. But that doesn’t mean it is not there and that we do not have to fight it.